Bridgestone adds two new sizes to LMD, P&D tire

E-commerce sales are still on their way up, which means that last-mile delivery and pickup-and-delivery trucks will see more miles, too. As a result, Bridgestone Americas has recently expanded its line of LMD and P&D tires, growing the Duravis M705 from five sizes to eight, with seven consumer sizes and three commercial sizes.

“We want to be out ahead of that [LMD and P&D growth] to be sure we supply the right products for those types of vehicles, as they're shifting to smaller vehicles than the traditional package trucks,” said Robert Hamby, director at Bridgestone Americas.

The new M705 tires will be available for LMD and P&D vehicles in sizes 215/75R17.5, 225/70R19.5, and 245/70R19.5, which the company said should cover most applications. And two more consumer sizes will be on the way in Q4.

“We'll have eight sizes that will be launched by the end of the year, and we're looking to expand to 10 sizes in the traditional consumer side later this year as well,” Hamby stated. “So I think we'll offer a full portfolio to those fleets looking to maximize their operations with one tire.”

Built for LMD and P&D

They also include features to better support LMD trucks, such as mixed tread design and 3D sipes to improve wear, which is particularly good for LMD vehicles that make lots of starts and stops.

“We really want to understand the operation in terms of delivering improved wear over, say, a traditional vehicle that was used in [LMD] application that may go and stop and not make as many deliveries in a day,” Hamby added.

Part of that included creating a mixed tread pattern for the M705, while historically trucks would use a rib tread for steer applications and then a lug pattern for drive applications. But according to Hamby, the need for a lug design “is not always there,” leading Bridgestone’s LMD tire to take a more middle-of-the-road approach.

Hamby said this mixed pattern can work “in all positions, but has some of those features of a drive product, but also maintains that function of a steer product in terms of a mixed pattern that can be used all throughout the vehicle.”

This lets the Duravis M705 work for all applications, not to mention the 3D siping for additional wear improvement.

But to suit LMD operations, the tire also had to be prepared for tight turns and be ready to resist curbing. To meet that need, Hamby noted that the M705 has “some sidewall features to add additional durability to that product,” which could eventually help with retreading and its overall durability.

Plus, as electric vehicles present a strong use-case for LMD, since they return to the yard each night, the M705 is designed to support gas, diesel, and electric vehicles, too. To do this, Hamby said Bridgestone designed the tire to handle the increased acceleration and torque that EVs exhibit.

“That's where we really wanted to focus on the tread design and tread compound to be sure we can achieve additional mileage,” Hamby explained.